Oui, I AM very excited to finally start my French class. Its a relief, because atleast now I know after 10 lessons I will be able to communicate with that lady in the cash register or ask for direction when I am lost in small villages of France much easily. Living in a country without knowing their language (in our case its plural…languageS, because in Belgium, you have to know both Dutch and French to get around) is not only hard, but its kinda irritating going to the grocery where you don’t know what you are buying 90% of the time. I still can’t find many things that I want when I go to the supermarket; sometimes it happened that I even bought wrong stuff.

Its been about 4 months now since we moved to Belgium. All this time I tried to get by with my 1 year of high school French that I took some 14/15 years ago. Few things that I still remember are Bonjour, Au revoir, Merci, Vou parlez anglais (do you speak English) and Je ne parlez pas francois (I don’t speak French). You really can’t do much with these few phrases/sentences especially when you are living amongst the French/Dutch. After all, we will be here for a while, so its wiser to just get out of the comfort zone and start getting involved with this new culture. And you can’t really enjoy a culture thoghourly unless you can interact with the locals.

I tried taking some free online courses, but it doesn’t help much with the pronounciation and doesn’t teach me any interesting facts about French culture. Whereas, my teacher (its a lady) not only corrects when I am wrong, conversates with me one-on-one, she also gives me lot of insights on this very sophisticated and rich language.

So, my plan is to first get done with this 10 lessons of French, then if I want to continue and move on to the next level, at that time may go for some more advance French classes, where hopefully I can actually read a French newspaper/magazine/understand French lyrics…WOW. Then after I am done with French, will start with Flemish (Dutch) lessons. I get too excited thinking that by the time I leave this country I will be able to speak/understand 2 more languages very well, these will be my true assets for the whole lifetime.

Ok, Au revoir (bye) for now and Bon nuit (goodnight). A bientot (see you soon)